"Whatever the facts of her life – whether she turned out to be an ancient man living in the Icelandic interior or a woman waiting tables at a Texan diner – Ferrante writes in an autobiographical mode. That is fuel for the truthers, a sort of literary ankle-flashing. But it is also good cover for another motive: a very contemporary form of envy of another’s autonomous space and their creativity, a rage that while they give us their work, they will not also give us their person." On a new collection of Elena Ferrante's letters, interviews and short pieces.

Robert Birnbaum and Tobias Wolfftalk short stories and other topics at The Morning News. Wolff: "Somebody once described the novel as a prose narrative of a certain length that has something wrong with it. I can think of a few novels that seem to have nothing wrong with them at all, but I can think of a lot more short stories that seem to me to be perfect."

It's not surprising when a graduate student claims to "live in the library," but an NYU student really does live in the university's Elmer Holmes Bobst Library. For only $225 a semester, the student rents library cubbies instead of an apartment. The idea isn't as crazy as it sounds, though, but is a response to the skyrocketing rent in the neighborhood.

The Naipaul Question, as Morgan Meis calls it, is simple: is V.S. Naipaul too offensive to be taken seriously? His recent biography includes scenes of abuse and moments of straightforward racism. But Meis thinks the issue is more complicated than whether Naipaul is a monster -- the author is, in his phrasing, too “protean” to be pinned down.